Tag Archives: Lesson

Fifty tips to set photography starters on their feet

There are some great things to learn.

When you are starting out and need to learn some things fast, it helps to have some guidance. Here are a few things photographers need to know to get started. And some things I wish I had known when starting photography…

Roller coasters ‘R’ us – Photo-learning list…
  1. If you want to learn fast take lots of pictures.
  2. If your pictures aren’t good enough, you’re not close enough.
  3. Spend more time reviewing your pictures than it took to make them.
  4. There are billions of types of light. Learn to see 10 types to start.
  5. Get obsessed with the quality of light and its properties.
  6. Work on image composition at least as hard as your technical skills.
  7. Use natural light as much as possible. Learn its variations.
  8. Don’t use on-board flash. It will ruin your shots.
  9. Make people a central study of your photography.
  10. Count 1000, 2000 slowly then take your camera from your face.
  11. Think carefully about how to do it well. Then follow a process.
  12. Clean your kit before you go out and when you’re back. Cameras hate dust.
  13. “Learners don’t need a tripod”. My biggest learning mistake.
  14. Sharpness is a habit – work hard to get it right from the start.
  15. Think “Why am I taking this picture?” for every shot you take.
  16. Add another lens to your “kit lens” as soon as you can.
  17. Great lenses are more use than an expensive camera. Spend more on them.
  18. Don’t cheap out on a tripod. Cheap ones will not do the job.
  19. Use your tripod.
  20. Own more than one memory card AND more than one battery.
  21. Learn the meaning of RAW and then shoot with it.
  22. “Your first 10,000 photographs are your worst.” ― H. Cartier-Bresson
  23. A keen digital photog can clear 10,000 shots in 14 days – shoot more.
  24. Make some photography gear. You’ll understand your needs.
  25. Gear lust replaces your photographic vision with a hole in your pocket.

More after this…

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  1. Carry your camera with you everywhere.
  2. Look at 50 pictures by other people every day.
  3. Take a clichéd shot – satisfy your curiosity. Store it in a secret place!
  4. The “Rule of thirds” works nearly all the time. Learn it early.
  5. Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” Leonardo da Vinci
  6. Read your camera manual. Try something. Read that bit again. Repeat.
  7. Have a go at every setting on your camera lots of times.
  8. A proper stance will provide a steady hand-held camera position.
  9. Amateurs often do better pictures than professionals.
  10. And, Professionals do more good pictures, more often.
  11. If your photos look tired and drab – go manual – learn control.
  12. For every shot you do, look at 50 similar ones. How does yours look?
  13. Don’t panic. Usually there is no problem.
  14. No photo, however good, replicates reality. Cameras distort – get over it.
  15. If you see it one way, most people will see it a different way.
  16. Check all gear before you go. Have a list of what you need.
  17. Know why you are going to a location and plan shots in advance.
  18. Back up your files. If your hard drive crashes you will lose the lot.
  19. Wear the right clothes. You cannot do good photography if you are cold.
  20. Help someone else to learn. You will learn too, and make a friend.
  21. Learn the meaning of “exposure” – practice using manual settings.
  22. Learn “Depth of Field” and practice it with each of your lenses.
  23. Post processing is an art and part of photography. Learn it.
  24. Join a club or class – you learn fast with other photogs.
  25. Use Google Images to research every shot you take.
And one for luck!

Photography is fun. Make sure you go with that!

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By Damon Guy (author and Photokonnexion editor)

Damon Guy - Netkonnexion

Damon Guy (Netkonnexion)

Damon is a writer-photog and editor of this site. He has run some major websites, a computing department and a digital image library. He started out as a trained teacher and now runs training for digital photographers.
See also: Editors ‘Bio’.

Three photography lessons from this one weird old trick!

Holding down the shutter button he peppered the area with repeat images... :: What happened to quality?

Holding down the shutter button he peppered the area with repeat images…
he was hoping for at least one good shot out of that lot!
(P.S. What every happened to forethought and quality?)

Ever hold down the shutter button and hope for the best?

We all have – in modern times at least. In the days of film we didn’t. It was just too expensive to do that. So, here is a lesson you can learn from changing your behaviour. Go for quality in your photography.

The wonderful world of digital has set us into a new era. We can take an individual shot for free, download it for free, process it for free, store it almost free. Wow! It could not be better. Little wonder that we see a shot that is just a little bit difficult and we press the button and start firing off our exposures like we had machine guns. What do we achieve? Dozens of shots that are almost identical. Many of them a waste of time and effort. We are really just hoping against the odds that the shot will some how work out. Think for a moment… Why did you not go for a quality shot that got what you wanted?

Have we lost the ability to ‘make’ a decisive, quality capture?

Try this exercise next time you go on a shoot. Pretend your memory card can only hold 36 exposures. That was the number of negatives you would get from a large roll of film. Next, given that you can only shoot off 36 frames, you need to do three things…

  • Think about each shot – carefully. Plan it, savour it. Make sure that you know what you are going to do before you even put your finger to the button. Set your camera up for it. Aim for a quality result.
  • Frame the shots. Compose each as if there was payback of $64,000 for every good shot. Pick the perfect composition for each press of the shutter button – make that shot pay!
  • Wait for just the right moment… add up all the variables in the shot until you have confidence it will work. At the right instant capture the image – make a photograph.

We seem to have forgotten the power of these three things that went into every photograph in former times:
Forethought;
Framing;
The decisive moment.

These simple things did a lot for photographers. They enabled us to learn what was important in a shot before we started. They helped us to know what we were trying to achieve. They taught us to get it right at the right moment. These simple things made us better photographers and produced quality results.

Comments, additions, amendments or ideas on this article? Contact Us
or why not leave a comment at the bottom of the page…

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Damon Guy - Netkonnexion

Damon Guy (Netkonnexion)

Damon is a writer-photographer and editor of this site. He has run some major websites, a computing department and a digital image library. He started out as a trained teacher and now runs training for digital photogs.
See also: Editors ‘Bio’.
By Damon Guy see his profile on Google+.